The present invention relates to improvements in a shift lever apparatus of a vehicle, more particularly, to a shift lever apparatus of a transmission having an automatic transmission mode and an automatic transmission mode.
Recently, automatic transmission with a manual transmission mode has been practically installed to an automotive vehicle. A typical shift lever apparatus of such an automatic transmission is provided with an automatic transmission mode (A/T mode) and a manual transmission mode (M/T mode). The A/T mode includes parking gear (P), reverse gear (R), neutral gear (N), drive gear (D), second gear (2) and first gear (1) positions, and the M/T mode includes an upshift range (plus range) and a downshift range (minus range). A shift lever of such a shift lever apparatus is arranged to be swingable in a shift groove including an A/T mode shift groove, a M/T mode shift groove parallel with the A/T mode shift groove, and a lateral movement groove connecting the A/T mode shift groove and the M/T mode shift groove. Some kinds of transmissions are arranged to fix the gear position in the D position by laterally swinging the shift lever set at the D position through the lateral movement shift groove to the M/T mode shift groove. Further, by swinging the shift lever in the M/T mode shift groove along the front and rear direction, an upshift or a downshift is executed according to a frontward swing to a plus range or a rearward swing to a minus range.